Chapter 17

SEVENTEEN

BASTIEN

Collins clawed and scratched at my hand around her wrist. She dug her heels into the ground and yanked against my hold. I was too strong for her, and her feet just slid across the floor. It would take her Stone Keeper power to beat me. She made these weird little frustrated and panicked whimpering sounds that I did not understand.

“Listen, listen, listen. Just listen, ” she cried, digging her nails into my skin. “Please just wait and listen. You don’t understand. This isn’t what you think. You don’t want me.”

I sighed. Is it possible she does not know who she is? That has to be it. I would have to find a way to explain it to her, to make her understand that she was what I wanted. I admired the fight in her, but I wasn’t about to let her go free in my mother’s castle. I had to get the Chaos Stone before my mother did, and Collins was the one to help me do it. And she was going to need my help. It was going to take both of us together to pull this off, which meant I had to get her to stop fighting me as soon as possible.

With a quick yank of my arm, I pulled her into my room and closed the door behind us. Every part of me wanted to slam the door and bolt it shut, but that would only bring unwanted attention on us. The second my grip on her released, Collins sprinted away from me. This wasn’t going well. I grabbed the chunk of hematite out of the bowl of crystals I kept by my door, then pressed it to the door. This palm-sized crystal was good for grounding and mental clarity, and it was my stone of choice when I needed a little help blocking my family from my space.

I spun around—then froze. Her sweater sleeve was caught halfway up her forearm. My stomach tightened into knots. There was something I’d been dying to know since the very moment I’d made eye contact with Collins Elliott. I’d known it wasn’t there in Las Vegas, but I also suspected it wouldn’t show until she got here. I had to look. I had to know. When Collins was around, I felt confused and alive. More alive than I had in all my years in this cold palace.

Before I could stop myself, I reached out and grabbed her arm. There was only one way to determine this. I yanked her sleeve up—nothing. Her pale skin was blank, clear of any markings or tattoos. I had no logical reason to think it could be, just a gut feeling, but I was wrong. Collins Elliott wasn’t my soulmate. There was no soulmate mark on her forearm. No image to match my own. Disappointment rushed through my body like an avalanche, bitter and destructive. There should have been a colorful image of leaves, roses, and a big butterfly—but there wasn’t.

Of course she isn’t your soulmate.

Mother probably already had her killed.

I sighed and scrubbed my face with my hands. I really thought it was going to be her. In First Realm, our soulmate marks changed to take the form of words. More specifically, the first words our soulmate said to us, written in an elegant black script on our skin. For eighty years, I’d seen the words we’ll burn that bridge when we get there on my arm. It wasn’t until recently I’d learned that that wasn’t even the correct use of the phrase— and then Collins said those exact incorrect words to me. I’d thought for sure that meant she was mine.

But she wasn’t.

Now I just wanted to vomit. I hadn’t realized I’d convinced myself so much that she was. Now that she wasn’t, I felt . . . I felt . . . damn it, why am I so annoyed by this? Her not being my soulmate was a good thing. It meant I could think clearly. It meant there was no conflict of interest, no extra layer of panic and fear in the Stone Keeper’s safety. Yet my heart plummeted into the pit of my stomach, and I hated how that felt.

Damn it, Bastien. Snap out of it. Get your head in the game.

You’ve got the Stone Keeper in your room and Mother hasn’t noticed yet.

Cry later, MOVE NOW.

I opened my eyes and my jaw dropped.

Collins sprinted around my room like a pixie in a glass case. Her face was ashy pale, and those aquamarine eyes were wider than I’d ever seen them. Words I couldn’t hear slipped from her lips too fast to register. I started forward but stopped short with my arms outstretched. Collins had her hands on the walls as she flew around my room, like she was looking for a crack she could slip through.

“No, no, no. This can’t be happening. Think, think, think !” Her breaths came in quick, panicked bursts. She paced back and forth and over again. “This can’t be happening. This isn’t right. We were just having fun. I can’t be here right now.”

I frowned and took another step forward.

She spun on me with wild eyes and threw her hands out. “Just wait a minute. Just listen. This is wrong. You’ve got it wrong. I need to explain—God, how do I even explain? Please don’t hurt me. I swear I’ll forget all about this.”

What is happening right now? I cocked my head to the side and eyed her carefully. Collins did not act like this. Shocked? Yes. Wary? Yes. But panicked? No. Definitely not. I may not have known her well, or long, but each time we’d encountered each other there was a sense of calmness about her. Even when I’d terrified her, I’d sensed a collectedness about her. In her eyes I’d seen calculation . . . but the eyes looking up at me now reminded me of a trapped animal about to attack in desperate self-defense. This was wrong. She was right.

I opened my mouth, then sighed and closed it. I’d gotten used to having no voice, but in this moment, I needed it more than ever. I cursed to myself and reached for the notebook on the shelf beside her and our arms grazed?—

“—misunderstanding—” she gasped, cutting herself off midsentence and leaping to the other side of the room in one graceful leap. “ Wait, wait, wait. Just hold on! I’m trying to explain!”

I froze.

That wasn’t right. It didn’t feel right. I hadn’t been paying close attention when I grabbed her and then I was focusing more on my family’s whereabouts when we arrived . . . but I was paying attention now. From the very first moment Collins and I had made eye contact, there’d been an undeniable pull. One I barely fought off. And the few times we’d touched, there’d been electricity, a spark that burned it was so hot. It was so intense that it hijacked my thoughts and plans when I was near her, which was how my sister had managed to surprise me. Twice.

Collins was captivating and intoxicating. She smelled of jasmine in springtime in First Realm, like the water falling from the floating islands here. Except . . . what is that scent? I closed my eyes and inhaled a deep breath, letting it fill my lungs. It was pine trees. I’d spent enough time in First Realm to know that scent. Everything about her was off right now. It didn’t smell like her. I felt nothing .

I opened my eyes and found Collins on the other side of my bed, staring at me with panic radiating out of her aura.

“Whoa, whoa. No. No.” She backed up a step and waved her arm. “Don’t you bibbidi-bobbidi-boo me! Wait one second and just listen to me.”

Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo? What does that mean? I scowled and stomped toward her, but she hissed like a cat and jumped back, slamming into the wall beside the fireplace.

“Look, tall, silent, scary dudeman. You need to just back the hell off.”

She didn’t even sound like her. There was a rough edge to her voice that she never had before. This couldn’t be Collins. Standing here before her, I felt it in the pit of my stomach. It was glaringly obvious now that I was paying attention. Which is exactly why it’s a GOOD thing she’s not your soulmate. I shook myself and sighed. There was a quick way for me to know if this person was actually Collins. I reached toward her, and she swatted at my hands, so I caught one and yanked her into place. She cursed at me, but I ignored it. I would never normally behave this way toward a woman, but in this, time was of the essence. With my free hand, I gripped the front of her sweater and tugged the collar down just enough to see if the necklace I’d given her in that dream was there.

But there was nothing. No jewelry at all. My necklace had magic in it. The real Collins wouldn’t have been capable of taking it off unless she was really trained in her power. But the real Collins this wasn’t. That much had been made painfully clear.

This wasn’t Collins.

Whoever this was, she was a fighter. She grunted and rammed her knuckles into my ribcage. I winced and dropped her—she leapt across the entire bed in the flash of an eye. She raced for the door. I cursed and chased after her. With my fae speed, I beat her there but barely. I placed my back against the door and glared at her, but she didn’t see. She’d already jumped straight across the room and was pulling on the balcony door. SHIT. My wings carried me over before she got the door open. I wrapped my arms around her waist and pulled her back.

“LET ME GO!” she screamed, kicking her legs.

I threw her onto the bed, letting her land gently in my pillows. Her body bounced off the mattress and then a pillow flew right at my face. I ducked my head to the side. She landed on her feet on the floor in a crouch. I frowned. Who ARE you?

She charged for my door. “Nope, nope, nope! You’ve got the wrong girl!”

That’s for damn sure.

I groaned silently and sped to block her path. She slid to a stop. That foreign, wild aura of hers slammed into my face like a fog. It was so blatantly, obviously not Collins.

“ Okay, okay, okay. I can explain. Just listen, okay?” She scrambled backwards, putting distance between us. “So, what had happened was there was this stuff at Peggy’s shop, and I drank it. Well, we did. It was my fault. I thought it would be fun to switch for a few hours, ya know? I mean she’s so small and her tits are tiny, and I just wanted to see what that was like, ya know? No, why would you know that? You’re a dude. You don’t have boobs and back pain. How could you understand?”

I frowned. Back pain? What is she talking about?

But she wasn’t stopping. Her arms flailed around, moving with every word she said. She bounced on her tiptoes like she couldn’t stop moving. “. . . and then I was her and she was me, and it was Freaky Friday, ya know? And this hair is going into my ass crack. Like, how does she handle this? Also, if I cut it, will my hair be shorter when I’m me? But I’m not supposed to be here right now. I cannot help you. I know why you want her but I’m not her. I can’t do the things because I’m not fae. I’m just me!”

In her defense, she had been saying I had the wrong girl and I needed to listen to her—all of which I’d ignored. Not to mention I had kidnapped her without checking I was getting the right person. This was all my fault. This girl, whoever she was, was of no use to me, but I couldn’t leave her here, I couldn’t leave her to the beasts that were my family. I grabbed her wrist and pulled her toward the door.

“You know this whole push me, pull me thing you do sucks,” fake-Collins muttered. “Collins will so never go for this. You ought to know that, my dude.”

I pulled her out the door and dragged her down the hall. There wasn’t a person in sight. They were all out running and playing all their own games, torturing whoever they felt like. I hurried down the hall while she mumbled threats and warnings that I suspected weren’t exactly empty. But if she didn’t stop talking, we were going to get caught and that would be bad for both of us.

“. . . because Collins will not?—”

I slammed my finger into her lips, forcing them closed. Her eyes widened. We both froze in the middle of the hallway. I made a point to meet her eyes, then looked to my left, then to my right. When I turned back to her, I pressed my fingers into my own lips. I arched one eyebrow and mouthed OR WE DIE. GOT IT?

She swallowed roughly. Her dark eyelashes blinked rapidly. But she nodded quickly.

I nodded once, then dropped my hands and took her elbow. The hall was bare of any pomp. Just stark, polished crystal walls. Outside, the snow fell in sheets as the wind whipped around the castle. I moved toward my mother’s chambers. Each step echoed in my veins like a drum. Mother wasn’t here. If she was, I’d have felt her power running through the whole damn place. It was not the kind of force that was missed. That was the only reason I was heading for her chambers with this imposter, despite the knots in my stomach. When I got to the double doors that led to her room, I shoved them open and didn’t stop.

Mother’s chambers consisted of several rooms, for varying purposes. Her bedroom was tucked in the back and definitely not where I was headed. I knew this girl wasn’t Collins, but I had no idea who she was . I didn’t want to hurt anyone, I wanted to put this girl back where she belonged—but I couldn’t go back to Megelle Island. Going there once had been risky. A second trip would garner me very unwanted attention from more than just my mother. And that was why I’d dragged this poor girl into a smaller room that housed one of mother’s most prized possessions.

There, in the middle of an empty room the size of a walk-in closet, stood a single black crystal on a black pedestal. It was two feet tall with jagged edges and fractures all around it. When I got closer, power vibrated from it in waves. It wasn’t what this stone could do, it was what this stone could nullify.

I grabbed fake-Collins’ hand and placed it on the stone. The air shimmered around her, and her appearance changed. Gone was her long, warm chocolate hair, and in its place was vivid, curly red hair. Her eyes turned from aquamarine to a vibrant emerald-green. She was no longer petite and ballerina-like, she was tall and shaped like an hourglass.

I wanted to smack myself. I knew exactly who this was.

Tallulah.

They’d been standing right next to each other in that shop. I should’ve known this was Tallulah for that reason alone, without reversing the magic. I should’ve known she wasn’t Collins . But I’d been so distracted in trying to grab her and get off the island without getting caught that I’d missed the mark. This was wrong. There was no confusing Collins’ aura with Tallulah’s. I just hadn’t taken that extra second to notice the aura was coming from Tallulah’s body.

Tallulah bit her bottom lip and shrugged. “See? Not Collins. How about you let me go home and we keep this secret between us? I don’t die and no one knows you took the wrong person. Deal?”

Shit.